Beyond the Banality of Evil by Augustine Brannigan;

Author:Augustine Brannigan;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: OUP Premium
Published: 2013-06-15T00:00:00+00:00

Conclusion: The Legacy of Complicity

The evidence examined here points to the ominous role of complicity in genocidal sociogenesis. Even if we accept that animosity between Rwandan Tutsis and Hutus intensified during the Hutu revolution of 1959–62, the conflicts associated with the struggle of Tutsis to return after being exiled in the 1990s would arguably not have had the same scope in the absence of French complicity. Yet there is no evidence that any of the key French actors shared the specific genocidal motives of the architects of the killings. The main motive appears to have been to keep Anglo-Saxon influence at bay in French Africa, and to prevent a repeat of the Fashoda crisis (i.e. routing of the French presence in the Sudan in 1898 by a British army).

The effect of the UN in Bosnia, particularly the policies of strict diplomatic impartiality, worked as a catalyst that created the time and opportunities for the Bosnian Serbs to achieve an extensive programme of ethnic cleansing of Bosniaks, including the indiscriminate murder of civilians in Sarajevo. Again, the breakup of Yugoslavia was rife with potential for ethnic violence. The assumption of total UN impartiality made the UN complicit, and raised stakes considerably, particularly in respect of the so-called ‘safe areas’ in Bosnia.

A legal point to be raised in the context of complicity concerns how accomplices may help contribute to the evidentiary requirements to establish the mental state required to establish genocidal intent on the part of the primary perpetrators. Several trial chambers struggled with whether this mental factor was an objective or subjective construct, or a combination. In Akayesu, the Chamber wrote, ‘intent is a mental factor which is difficult, even impossible to determine’ (paras 523–4). However, in the absence of a confession, several considerations can tip the balance, including ‘the scale of atrocities committed’. The evidence reviewed here makes a strong case for the contribution of accomplices in raising the scale of atrocities that bring mass slaughter into the conventional definition of genocide.

What this analysis suggests is that ‘the completion of the act of genocide’ requires coordination of action across various levels of society: the mobilization of the perpetrators, the logistical support conveyed to them in terms of arms, material support, and leadership, and the ideological reinforcement of their efforts. Each step is a transition point capable of escalating or attenuating the crime of genocide. Correspondingly, each has a potential role in deterring or preventing such crimes. The question of deterring such crimes is usually associated with the criminal law. In the next chapters, we address the legal responses to genocide and other crimes against international humanitarian law.

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